Direct public funding of science

Currently, NIH funds the majority of biology research in USA using taxpayer dollars. The success of the NIH system and the adaptation of the scientific community to NIH have made this system stable and dependable. A significant amount of additional support for biology research, especially health related research, also comes from foundations. Some of them such as Bill&Melinda Gates foundation, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute provide substantial financial support far exceeding and often more attractive than what even NIH offers. A lot of good science have been done and fundamentally important discoveries been made by scientists who have been recipients of grants from all these sources. However, the success of NIH funding philosophy has influenced every major biological research funding operation that goes on in USA. Its impact is so widespread that the alternative funding options seem to be a product of inbreeding and incapable of providing new cultures or avenues that would complement the goals of NIH. As a result, the differences between most of these foundations that have clear independent goals are only superficial and all of them operate essentially on the same principles as NIH.

The NIH funding philosophy

NIH fellowships and grants come in different flavors with one underlying foundation, which is the provision of an efficient and goal-oriented institutionalized system that takes into account national priorities. This system makes sure that the available budget is prioritized and distributed between various sub-disciplines. Policy-makers arrive at these decisions through a systematic process, which tunes itself to changing demands from time to time. The institutionalized system makes sure that adequate resources are constantly available for the carrying out the funding process with a high efficiency by maintaining and providing trained pools of peer-reviewers (scientific colleagues) and program managers. The system of peer-review ensures that support is provided ONLY to scientists (or emerging scientists) who are likely to be successful. This is largely decided by three factors- 1) their prior success and pedigree 2) current environment of support and 3) the likely success of their research proposals based on preliminary evidence and arguments they provide in support thereof. The independent foundations that fund biology have also adopted the same principles and have not thought seriously outside the hat. So far, no one has argued with the success of NIH philosophy.

Alternatives?

So what is wrong with the current philosophy? Not much. The current system has provided everyone with steady and dependable advancement in science. In theory, there should be nothing to complain except that at unsure economic times (such as the one we are going through at present), NIH budget falls really short of demands and expectations of the scientific community. But a different kind of question is the following- is it so perfect that nothing different can be done? Not exactly. This is where Fundscience comes in. When David (CEO, Fundscience), talked to me about Fundscience’s objectives and how he plans to meet those, I was thrilled by the revolutionary nature of the philosophy behind it. To draw a parallel, it is like a constitutional amendment for the scientific nation, giving every individual a right to participate directly in science. Fundscience facilitates anyone to fund the science of his or her choice, directly.

Fundscience takes a giant philosophical leap from NIH and its inbred cousins. It primary goal is to tune the system to the time we live in. It is intended to let any ‘curious interested person’ (CIP; a term I am coining for the convenience of this discussion) to participate and bring the discussion and practice of science more into the open. One could say that it is built on similar lines as the successful philosophies of wikipedia and youtube. It attempts to bridge the conspicuous absence of a direct connection between a CIP and the scientific enterprise, which he/she is funding anyway! It proposes to build this bridge by taking out the common denominator of a seemingly inaccessible organization from the picture and putting a CIP in direct charge. It is as if the lobbyists and special interest groups have been removed from Washington! It is a community concept that is likely to succeed by creating a new niche where it does not clash with existing system and nicely supplements it.

Message for CIPs

For the science loving CIP, who wishes to take part in directly funding of his/her choice, Fundscience provides this avenue directly. The CIPs and trained scientists could work together on something that both are interested in. It could be anything ranging from something as complex and challenging as the study of cytoplasmic organization or something that could appear silly on the surface. This new philosophy would let people choose the science they want to fund by directly choosing from a list of scientists and available projects for funding. CIPs take the place of peer-reviewers! For the scientist who is interested in getting involved- convince a CIP and he might fund you directly! If a CIP is very rich, he/she could fund the science he/she loves directly. CIPs who are not very rich could come together to rate the various projects that are described online for funding. Then the projects could be chosen based on a public rating system for fun, importance to health, understanding of basics or specifics for which currently no funding is available, educational tools, exploratory tools, analytical tools, commercial applications…a long list that is left to be filled by the CIPs in charge. The possibilities are endless. Currently, the other available option for a CIP is to donate and loose track of his/her donation. If his/her donation were sizable, an attractive reward would be a building or a hall or a scientist named after him/her depending on the size of the donation. No much fun, right? I will bet that direct interaction and participation of the scientists and the community they serve would be a refreshing new way to conduct scientific research for both groups. In addition to acting as an additional resource-generating platform for scientists, it would also provide immense opportunities for public science education.

For the CIPs out there, this is what I (as an aspiring scientist myself) feel about Fundscience- Fundscience aspires to be the youtube or wikipedia for science funding. In a sense Fundscience could be your scientific vote just as youtube is your media vote! Depending on individual circumstances it will complement or supplement the University- and NIH-based funding avenues for science. With the participation of CIPs, Fundscience would make science a community enterprise. So CIPs out there- hop on Fundscience and become involved in some serious fun!